This invention relates to a conveyor apparatus having a plurality of side-by-side arranged conveyor tracks, situated in a first plane, for advancing edgewise upright-oriented face-to-face engaging flat articles such as confectionery items (cookies, biscuits, crackers or the like) to separate packing machines, one associated with each conveyor track. The conveyor apparatus further includes an additional conveyor for advancing the items from one selected conveyor track to a standby packing machine. Each conveyor track has a conveyor belt portion which is pivotal about a horizontal axis oriented perpendicularly to the direction of advance. In its normal position, the conveyor belt portion advances the articles to a further portion of the same conveyor track, while in another pivotal position it advances the articles to the additional conveyor apparatus.
A conveyor apparatus of the above-outlined type is known and is disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,553,658. The known apparatus is adapted to handle elongated bar-shaped articles such as chocolate bars, rather than disc or wafer-shaped items. The known apparatus includes a plurality of parallel-arranged conveyor tracks situated in an upper plane for advancing items to separate packing machines. Each conveyor track is equipped with a routing device by means of which, in case of a standstill of the associated packing machine, the stream of articles can be detoured to an accumulating or storage belt situated underneath the conveyor track. A horizontally pivotal removal conveyor belt is aligned with the storage belt and advances the items to a standby packing machine. While this apparatus has proved to be efficient in operation, it has the disadvantage that it has a substantial spatial requirement.